Thursday, March 10, 2011

Shouldn't James O'Keefe have been arrested by now?


James O'Keefe, Tea-bagger video guerilla, leaving a Lousiana courthouse in 2010, after getting off with only 100 hrs. of community service and 3 years probation following a telephone interference indictment for meddling with Sen. Mary Landrieu's phone lines.




And once more, the appointed Tea Party hitman James O'Keefe has staged a sneak saboteur's delight, this time making a hit on NPR fund-raiser Ron Schiller, secretly taped asserting the Teap Party was full of white middeleAmericans, and chocked with "racist, really racist people. Well, doh! Has anyone visited their blogs lately? Have you seen the desipicable racist filth they've put up there? In case anyone hasn't check out the images from one Florida Teabagger's blog.

I mean is it really necessary, after beholding these, to even remotely entertain the bunkum that what's on offer here is "political speech"? It is rather blatant, UGLY and outright hostile RACISM, including the blatant display of the Rebel Flag! As I've noted in many forums (e.g. Salon.com. Smirkingchimp.com), the Confederate traitors and their ilk still haven't surrendered, they are determined to take this country back via the Republican Southern Party and bring back bibles in schools, slaves (owned by corporations) as they remove women from the workplace - opting to keep them "barefoot and pregnant" as all abortion and health services are gutted by de-funding.

For those who still have doubts, rather than me belabor this any more, I suggest you get hold of Joshua Zeitz' article Dixie's Victory in the September, 2001 issue of American Heritage magazine. You will see how from every end the Confederates have sought to turn the clock back, from their tax cuts to defund government, to their extolling corporatism and the "Citizens United" decision (which elevates corporate speech over ordinary citizens' speech) to their attacks on reproductive rights and women's choice, not to mention now slaughtering collective bargaining in unions - to return the last bastion of free labor to slavery.

Anyway, let me return to James O'Keefe. I again ask why this gentleman hasn't been placed behind bars?

Let me remind readers (who may not know), that most states have serious laws against secretly taping or recording people without their knowledge or consent. This first came to light nearly twelve years ago in the Monica Lewinsky case, when many Maryland lawyers brought up the fact that the evidence Ken Starr planned to use to impeach Clinton was illegally obtained.

That evidence, to remind readers, was via Linda Tripp secretly tape recording Monica Lewinsky over her phone line in Columbia, MD then making it available to right winger Lucianne Goldberg who made it public ('The RightWing Web', in NEWSWEEK, February 22, 1999, p.3). Goldberg then made the tapes available to Starr who used them to nail Clinton. (Of course, Clinton denied any sexual liasons with Lewinsky since he couldn't have known someone would have secretly taped her recounting of events over the phone, neither could have Lewinsky).

But rather than adhere to the Maryland laws against secret wiretapping of phone lines, which was a felony, Starr and his right wing loons steamrolled over the complaints, ignoring the laws which never would have allowed that evidence as admissible.

The same applies to O'Keefe's antics. In the case of his ACORN stunt in D.C. nearly a year or so ago, it also came to light that D.C. had similar laws to those in Maryland, requiring a person disclose before hand the presence of recording equipment and when it is on. Again, percipient lawyers in the know brought up this point, asserting that all O'Keefe's illegally obtained "evidence" ought to be chucked. Their cries were roundly ignored and drowned out by the media which instead showed the sensational video (further violating the law) over and over as we beheld the spectacle of ACORN punished, as Clinton was because of these underhanded guerilla tactics favored by the wingnut Nazis.

The fact O'Keefe employed the hidden tactics against NPR fund raiser Ron Schiller in Georgetown, also in D.C. - means the same laws against hidden recording were also applicable. So why hasn't O'Keefe been arrested? Ignorance of the law is NO excuse!

It is time serious lawyers, representatives, media and others begin questioning O'Keefe's tactics and asking why aren't the appropriate state, D.C. laws being adhered to when broken. Why is everyone turning their heads from the issue that sneak recording of people in those places that prohibit it, is disallowed, as should be the evidence.

No wonder this country is headed for the shitcan if it can't even apply and enforce its own legislation!

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